Heretofore, numerous video systems have been employed to probe images or scenes at one place and display them at another. It goes without saying that most of these constitute prior art which is well known to the artisan and which requires no further discussion.
Of course, there are several prior art devices which are ostensibly of some significance, inasmuch as they in some manner concern subject matter that is pertinent to the instant invention.
For example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,949,490 to Derderian et al discloses a multisensor simulator utilizing a plurality of transparencies as a data base.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,052,753 to Schwartz et al discloses the use of a television camera in conjunction with a modelboard depicting a runway, with provision for angular motion of the camera lens.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,422,207 to Flower et al is representative of a number of patents which attempt to simulate natural obscuration in the trainee's vision.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,100,571 discloses the method and apparatus of generating a 360.degree. visual scene.
From inspection of the aforementioned and other similar patents, it may readily be inferred that many attempts have been made to simulate vehicular motion scenes by mechanical, electrical, and optical means; however, insofar as is known, none thereof have incorporated the improvements of the instant invention which allow the simulation of visual and forward looking infrared imagery from the same scene.
The use of forward looking infrared reconnaissance (FLIR) in the military is only a few years old; therefore, its use and characteristics are relatively unkown among the servicemen who will be called on to use it.